Handmade Sweets

Have you ever created a cake that was a hit… and were then asked to recreate it later on? Me too… often.

I was a hairstylist for 10 years and also did wedding hair for much of that time. Eventually, I gave up the wedding hair part of it for a specific reason. It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy the updos – I loved them! I would meet with the bride for her practice hair appointment and all would go just swell. Frustratingly, though, I would go to recreate the updo on the wedding day and struggle with it. Every. Single. Time. I felt like the wedding day hair was never as good as the practice hair… but what bride is willing to forgo the practice session? So, I eventually dropped that from my hair menu.

I find that recreating cakes can be the same level of difficulty for me at times. It’s not like I take step by step measurements and notes all along the way, so my colors might turn out slightly different or my sizes may vary. It has taken me some getting used to stepping back and re-entering the initial design mode that allowed me to create the first one.

You might remember this cake:

With it’s soft, hand-painted look and classic appeal, this cake was a blast and a favorite.

I was asked to recreate this cake and was excited to do so! My customer wanted some changes made, however… she wanted this cake turned into a two-tier and with more characters included. Begin the design process once again!

How was I going to tie the beehive at the top in with a two-tier cake, and how was I going to include the characters and the classic storybook sky without having one big open sky tier?

I decided to go with one of my favorite parts of the classic storybook… when Pooh “rides” a balloon up to the beehive in the tree.

Being that this was a birthday cake, I decided to ahead and bring the birthday balloon theme in as well, and as a way to tie the other characters in to the overall theme of the cake.

And of course I included the birthday boy’s name on top.

Overall, I was pleased with this cake!

I could definitely pick on the details… of course I have already. I could be worried that the colors are too vibrant, or that my blue sky sponge effect turned out a bit differently than last time. I could go on.

But this is where I’m going to learn that each cake IS actually a different project, with previous cakes only as inspiration.

Just as we strive to avoid copying another cake designer’s work exactly, I’m going to decide that we should do the same with our own work. I would say Pooh cake 2.0 turned out fabulously, right down to it’s tiny wafer paper bee wings!